The Adventures of Kathlyn eBook

Umballa, impatient as he was, had to depend upon patience.
By dint of inquiries he learned that wild Mohammedans
had cast the spell upon the cave, set a curse upon
its threshold. Umballa tottered and destroyed
this by reasoning that the curse of a Mohammedan could
not affect a Hindu. Finally, he offered each
and all of them a fortune—­and won.

Torches were lighted and the cave entered. There
were many side passages; and within these the astute
Umballa saw the true reason for the curse of the Mohammedans:
guns and powder, hundreds and hundreds of pounds of
black destruction! A lower gallery—­the
mouth of which lay under a slab of rock—­led
to the pit wherein rested the filigree basket. . .
. For a time Umballa acted like a madman.
He sang, chanted, dug his hands into the gold and
stones; choked, sobbed. Here was true kingship;
the private treasures of a dozen decades, all his
for the taking. He forgot his enemies and their
nearness as the fortune revealed itself to him.

As his men at length staggered out of the lower gallery
with the basket slung upon an improvised litter he
espied his enemies marching up the hill! Back
into the cave again. Umballa cursed and bit his
nails. He was unarmed, as were his men, and
he had not time to search among the smuggled arms
to find his need.

“Heaven born,” spoke up the man who had
known where the cave was, “there is an exit
on the other side. We can go through that without
yonder people noticing us.”

“A fortune for each of you when you put this
on the sloop!”

Back through the cave they rushed, torches flaring.
Once a bearer stumbled over a powder can, and the
torch holder all but sprawled over him. Umballa’s
hair stood on end. Fear impelled the men toward
the exit.

“There is powder enough here to blow up all
of Hind! Hasten!”

At the mouth of the exit the men with the torches,
finding no further need of them, carelessly flung
them aside.

“Fools!” roared Umballa; “you have
destroyed us!”

He fled. The bearers followed with the burden.
Down the side of the promontory they slid.
Under a projecting ledge they paused, sweating with
terror. Suddenly the whole island rocked.
An explosion followed that was heard half a hundred
miles away, where the gunboat of the British Raj patrolled
the shores. Rocks, trees, sand filled the air,
and small fires broke out here and there. The
bulk of the damage, however, was done to the far side
of the promontory, not where the frightened Umballa
stood. A twisted rifle barrel fell at his feet.

“To the sloop!” he yelled. “It
is all over!”

On the far side the other treasure seekers stood huddled
together, scarce knowing which way to turn.
The miracle of it was that none of them was hurt.
Perhaps a quarter of an hour passed before their
faculties awoke.